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We Need Your Help to Save Our Charity From Closure

24 April 2015

SWR MIND LAUNCHES £20,000 EMERGENCY FUNDRAISING APPEAL

Scarborough, Whitby and Ryedale (SWR Mind) gives life-saving help to almost 1,000 people with mental health problems across the Yorkshire coast and we have launched a major £20,000 fund-raising campaign to save our charity from closure.

SWR Mind has carried out work in the community since 1962 and we have a team of 20 staff helped by dozens of volunteers who run nine different projects locally.

These include a daytime telephone helpline, drop in groups, one to one social support and help with finances and housing.

We also work alongside nursing staff in Scarborough Hospital’s A&E with people who are experiencing a mental health crisis as part of a joint project with the Cambridge Centre.

We urgently need to raise £20,000 to stay afloat until August 2015 but our longer-term goal is to raise a further £80,000 to secure the long-term future of our charity.

Although SWR Mind is affiliated to the national Mind charity, we have to raise our own funds to provide our vital services and we do not receive any of the money generated from donations made to Mind’s charity shops across the country.

SWR Mind is making a desperate appeal to residents, businesses and any other organisations to help us hit our £20,000 fund-raising target by the end of May 2015.

If the money is not raised in time, SWR Mind will have to axe our projects and our staff, leaving the people who use our services unsupported at a time when NHS-funded mental health services are also at breaking point due to cutbacks.

You can donate now to our appeal online via our website by clicking here which will take you to our Just Giving page.

You can also send a cheque made payable to Scarborough, Whitby and Ryedale Mind, PO Box 304, Scarborough, YO11 3YJ.

Duncan Webster, Chairman of SWR Mind’s board of trustees said: “It would be catastrophic for people who use our services and the local community if we were to close.

“In these times of austerity more people are coming to SWR Mind in crisis, desperate for support, as other services are cut.

“Around 40,000 people – that’s one in four people living in Scarborough Whitby and Ryedale - will experience mental health difficulties at some time in their lives.

“Mental health can affect so many of us at some time in our lives, often leaving people isolated and unheard. Please support us and ensure that people you know and love do not have to endure mental ill health alone.

“We want to continue supporting people across the region to achieve their goals and live the life that they want. Please donate as much as you can.”

Once the immediate funding crisis is resolved, SWR Mind is hoping to raise a total of £80,000 from donations, grant applications and money from other funding partners.

SWR Mind is the only charity in the area to take urgent referrals from other services for people suffering from illnesses including anxiety, depression, lifelong illnesses such as Bipolar and Schizophrenia, and those experiencing psychosis or battling an eating disorder.